Wallace - Wallace: Piano Music Vol. 1, 'Opera Fantasies'

As an internationally admired opera composer, William Vincent Wallace was perfectly placed to provide brilliant fantasies and paraphrases from the operatic repertoire, refashioned for the domestic piano market. Most in this selection date from 1850-57 and exude his virtuoso, often Lisztian, instinct for bravura. He didn't neglect his own works - there's an especially lovely aria from his opera Lurline, as well as an extensive fantasia on themes from Maritana, perhaps his best known work. Rosemary Tuck's playing of Wallace has been acclaimed for herideally deft and scintillatingly assured performances. Gramophone.